National Post Editorial Board: For China, the rule of law remains elusive

Despite China's economic success, the rule of law remains elusive

When Chinese dissident Chen Guangcheng escaped house arrest and sought refuge in the United States embassy in Beijing this spring, the world was reminded of China’s authoritarian ways. The country has made such significant and quick strides toward a free economy that it’s easy to forget what a scarce commodity political freedom remains there. But Mr. Chen — whom China has subjected to beatings, a sham trial, over four years of imprisonment, and forced isolation for his human rights work — remembers.

The blind activist is in New York now, pursuing his legal studies at NYU, yet Mr. Chen still provides regular insight into the way government works in his country of citizenship.

In recent weeks, Mr. Chen has been campaigning for help for his imprisoned nephew Chen Kegui. The younger Mr. Chen has been detained for approximately three months now, having been arrested on charges of attempted murder following his uncle’s escape. His family says he is a scapegoat — a victim of Chinese authorities’ rage over the realization that his uncle had managed to evade the guards, walls and video surveillance meant to confine him. The elder Mr. Chen insists that his nephew was beaten savagely by guards and police who stormed, late at night, into the home where the younger Mr. Chen was staying. They had no warrants and wore no uniforms. His nephew raised a kitchen cleaver in legitimate self-defense, Mr. Chen says.

Chen Kegui has not been heard from all summer. According to Reuters, the Chinese government confiscated the license of a lawyer who volunteered to represent the younger Mr. Chen, and authorities threatened to repeat the trick with another lawyer who stepped up to help. The government will only let his defense be handled by legal aid lawyers, whom it controls. The family fears he is being tortured. The whole affair underlines the charge the elder Mr. Chen made about China in a May op-ed he published in The New York Times: The country has plenty of laws to protect its citizens in theory (a vast improvement over the unabashedly authoritarian past), but it lacks the rule of law, which would enforce these protections in practice. This has to change before China can be truly considered a reformed nation.

“In real life,” Mr. Chen explains in the Times, “[legal] cases of any significance are controlled at every level of the judicial system by a Communist Party political-legal committee, rather than by legal officials.

From the Yinan County Basic Court to the Supreme People’s Court in Beijing, it is this committee that directs the actions of the police, prosecutors and judges, transforming these ostensibly independent actors into a single, unchallengeable weapon.”

The question of the moment is what, if any, practical response can the West offer to this repressive reality? Mr. Chen visited Washington, D.C. last month to plead with U.S. lawmakers to aid his nephew, yet surface American meddling is unlikely to do much more than infuriate Chinese authorities — and encourage them to crack down harder and more effectively on dissidents in the future. We know about Chen Kegui’s plight because his uncle broke free of his captors and made it out of China. Chances are, the Chinese won’t make that mistake again. And there is no political appetite in the U.S. for more serious meddling along the lines of sanctions or military involvement — nor would such moves be wise ways to improve the lots of the greatest number of human beings.

But China is not immune to a sense of vanity and a desire for respect, if not approval, from the rest of the world. The key is to try to gently play on that need by keeping a constant public airing of its authoritarian and repressive acts toward its own people

From our perspective, Mr. Chen has the right idea. He remains upbeat — saying he is optimistic about China’s ability to reform, and telling all who will listen that he plans to return home when he is done his studies in the States (whether or not this will be possible remains to be seen). Yet at the same time, Mr. Chen continues to methodically and unapologetically catalogue the endless ways in which China is violating its citizens’ human rights. And as he does so, he makes sure the world can’t forget the dark side of the successful and powerful nation from which he hails.

China’s economic reforms have helped its people tremendously, but it is still a tough and brutal place. Let’s remember that.